The Massachusetts Review, Inc.

A Week like Any Other Week Author(s): Natalya Baranskaya and Emily Lehrman Source: The Massachusetts Review, Vol. 15, No. 4 (Autumn, 1974), pp. 657-703 Published by: The Massachusetts Review, Inc. Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25088483 Accessed: 10-01-2020 16:38 UTC

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This content downloaded from 152.23.0.181 on Fri, 10 Jan 2020 16:38:35 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Natalya Baranskaya

A Week Like Any Other Week Translated by Emily Eehrman

The following name variants appear for characters in this story Olga Niklayevna Vorok6va 61ya, 61ka, 61enka Valentina Vasilyevna Valya, Valechka Lusya Vartanovna Markoryan Dark Ltisya Ludmila Lychk6va Ludmilka, Luska, Lusya, Blonde Liisya, Blondie Marya Matveyevna M.M. Shura Shurochka Dima Dimka, Dim K6stya K6tya, K6tka Gulya Gulka, Gulenka

Monday

I'm running, running up the stairs, and on the third floor landing I run into Yakov Petrovich. He asks me into his office and inquires about my work. He doesn't say a word about my being late: fifteen minutes. Last Monday it was twelve minutes; he talked to me then, too, only it was later in the day: he wanted to know what journals and catalogs?American and English?I had examined. The labora tory sign-in book was lying on his desk, and he kept looking at it; but he didn't say anything. Today he reminds me: the testing of the new fiberglass plastic must be completed in January. I answer that I do remember. "The report is due in the first quarter," he says. I know; I couldn't possibly forget. Yakov Petrovich's small dark eyes are swimming around in the pink flesh of his face, and, catching my eye, he asks: "Olga Niko layevna, you won't be late with the testing, will you?"

? Copyright Emily Lehrman 1974. This story originally appeared in Novy Mir, No. 11, 1969. 657

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I flush and keep silent, uncomfortably. Of course, I could say: "No, of course not. What are you saying?" It'd be better if I said that. But I keep silent?how can I be sure? In a quiet, even voice Yakov Petrovich says: "Considering your interest in your work and . . . er . . . your aptitude, we have trans ferred you to the vacant position of a junior scientist; we have as signed you to a group which is working on an interesting problem. I will not conceal from you that we are somewhat worried . . . er . . . surprised, that you do not, so to speak, seem to be approaching your work with sufficient care. . . ." I keep silent. I love my work. I appreciate the chance to work independentiy. I work eagerly. I don't believe that I've been treat ing my work with insufficient care. But I'm often late, especially on Mondays. What can I say? I only hope this is just a dressing down, nothing more. A dressing down for lateness. I mutter some thing about the icy paths and snow banks in our new district, the bus which comes to our stop overfilled, the terrible crowd at the Sokol metro station . . . and with a miserable feeling of nausea I remember that I have said all this before. "You must get yourself better organized, Olga Nikolayevna," con cludes Yakov Petrovich. "Forgive me for, so to speak, preaching to you, but you are only beginning your career. . . . We have the right to hope that you will value the trust which we have placed in you as a young specialist. . . ." He stretches out his lips so they make a smile. This ready-made smile makes me slightly sick. In a hoarse voice that doesn't sound like my own I tell him that I am sorry, promise to get myself better organized, and dash out into the hall. I run, but at the doors of the laboratory I remember I haven't combed my hair this morning; I turn and run along the long narrow corridors of the old building, formerly a hotel, into the lavatory. I comb my hair, putting my hair pins on the sink; I look at myself in the mirror and I hate myself. I hate my messed-up curly hair, my sleepy-looking eyes, my boyish face with a big mouth and a nose like Pinocchio's. With a face like this, why wasn't I born a man? Having combed my hair?more or less?I fix my sweater and stride back along the corridors. I must be calm. But the conversation with the chief is spinning around inside my head like a reel of tape. Individual words, phrases, intonations?everything appears to me to be alarmingly significant. Why did he keep saying "we"?"we entrusted," "we are worried"? So he has talked about me?with whom? With the director? What was it he said?"worried" or "sur 658

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prised"? "Surprised"?that's worse. And this reminder about the vacant position. . . . Lydia Chistyakova wanted it. She had seniority, but they picked me?my specialty was closer. And, of course, my English helped. The laboratory makes good use of it. Taking me into his group and giving me the job of testing new materials six months ago, Yakov Petrovich was, of course, taking a risk. I realize this. With Lydia he would have been surer about meeting deadlines. . . . And what if he wants to give my work over to her now? That would be terrible?I've already done almost all of the experiments. But maybe I am exaggerating everything? Maybe it's just my constant anxiety, eternal rushing, fear?I won't make it on time, I'll be late. . . . No, he only wanted to reprimand me; he's annoyed by my lateness. He's right. And, ultimately, it is his responsibility. We know our chief?he is a real worker, a perfectionist. Well, that's all, enough of this! I switch my thoughts: I will now make up the summary of the results of tests for resistance to heat and to temperature change which we finished on Friday. I'm not worried about tests in the physico-chemical laboratory?they're nearly finished. But the phys ico-mechanical tests?they're our bottleneck. In the mechanical laboratory there is a shortage of equipment, there are not enough hands. Hands, well, that's all right?we have our own two pairs; we do much of the work ourselves. But some of the equipment. . . . You have to sign up for it and wait. You have to "keep watching," as Yakov Petrovich puts it, or, in simple terms, to "keep pushing." I push for the fiberglass plastic; another group pushes for something of theirs. We all keep running to the first floor, fawning over the chief laboratory technician who arranges the test schedule and sees that we stick to it; we call her Valechka or Valentina Vasilyevna, and try in every possible way to squeeze through some chink, should one but open somewhere. Yes, I must run over to Valya's. I run downstairs, push open the heavy door; a wave of sound rushes at me, but I pass through it and step behind the glass partition. This is Valya's "small office"; it's usually crowded with people, but right now she's here alone. I ask her to "squeeze us in" this week. Valya shakes her head, "No," but I continue to beg her. "Maybe in the second half of the week; stop in then." Now to my own place, the polymer laboratory. In our "quiet" room, where we analyze the results and make our calculations, there are nine people, and room for only seven desks. But there is always someone at the testing laboratory, or at the library, or away on a 659

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professional trip. Today one of the desks is mine. And it has already been wasted for forty minutes. I enter. I am met by six pairs of eyes. I nod and say, "I stopped off at the mechanical lab." The blue eyes of Blonde Lusya are worried: "Something hap pened?" The huge fiery eyes of Dark Lusya are sympathetically reproach ful: "Again?" Marya Matveyevna's look, over her glasses, warns: "Only, please, no talking!" Half covered by her painted eyelids, Alia Sergeyevna's gaze is absent-minded: "Who's there? What's there?" Shura's wide eyes, always somewhat frightened, open still wider. Zinaida Gustavovna's sharp pupils pierce and immediately ex pose: "We know your mechanical lab. You were late and were called down. Your cheeks are binning and your eyes look upset." Our group consists of the two Lusyas and me. Our chief is Yakov Petrovich. But it is Lusya Markoryan who is mostly in charge. When I came to work in polymers, the new fiber glass plastic was still in the planning stage. Only Lusya was con juring with the analytical scales, the flasks, the thermostat. She was working on the new compound. Everyone believed the idea of the new fiberglass plastic belonged to Markoryan, but then it turned out to be Yakov's. I once asked her: "Lusya Vartanovna, why do they say that it was you who invented the new fiberglass plastic?" She looked at me: "Do they say that? Is that so? Well, let them say it." And no more. Then, another time, she promised to tell me this "silliest story." So far, she is keeping quiet, and I don't ask any more. I am responsible for the tests. Some I do myself, some together with the technicians of the different laboratories. Then I analyze and evaluate all the results. Blonde Lusya presses and molds samples for the tests?strictly according to set standards?and generally helps around. We also have Zinaida Gustavovna, in part. She's responsible for the planning and the paper work for all the groups, and for negotia tions with our clients. There is work enough for everybody. Now I am at my desk. I open the drawer to get the tests journal and suddenly notice a questionnaire lying on my desk. On the top in bold type: "A Questionnaire for Women," and in pencil in the corner: "O. N. Voronkova." That's interesting! I look around. Blonde Lusya shows me she has one like it. The questionnaire is long. I start reading it. 660

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Point 3: "Composition of your family: husband . . . children under 7 years of age . . . children from 7 to 17 . . . other relatives living with you." Husband, one; children, two; grandmothers and grand fathers, alas, none; other relatives live elsewhere. Then this question: "What do your children attend?creche,1 nursery school, extended day school." My children, of course, attend the creche and the nursery school. The authors of the questionnaire want to know what kind of quarters I live in: "Is it a separate apartment. . . amount of space: number of square meters . . . number of rooms, conveniences. . . ." My living quarters are excellent?a new apartment, thirty-four square meters, three rooms. . . . Oh, yes! They want to know absolutely everything about me. They are interested in my lif e hour by hour . . . "in the given period of time." Aha, the "period" is a week. How many hours do I spend on "a) housework, b) child care, c) leisure." Leisure is explained as cultural activity: "radio and television, movies, theatre, etc., reading, sports, tourism, etc." Oh, leisure, leisure. . . . What a clumsy word, "lei-sure." "Women fight for leisure!" What nonsense. Lei-sure. Personally, my sport is running. Running here, running there. A shopping bag in each hand and . . . up, down: trolleybus, autobus; into the metro, out of the metro. Our district has no stores; we've been living there for over a year, and they haven't been finished yet. I'm commenting on the questionnaire in this manner to myself, but with the next question all desire to wisecrack disappears: "Days excused from work on account of illness: yours, your children's (the number of work days for the past year; we ask you to give the information based on the time-sheet)." The finger right into the sore spot! Goes with this morning's conversation with the chief. The adniinistration knows, of course, that I have two children. But nobody has ever added up the number of days I stay home on their account. They will learn this statistic and suddenly they'll get frightened. Maybe I'll get frightened myself?I've never added them up either. I know that there are many. . . . But how many? It is now December. In October both had the flu?it started with Gulka, then Kotka got sick?I think, two weeks. In November, colds ?the remnants of the flu flared up in bad weather?around eight days. In September there was the chicken pox?Kotka brought it from nursery school. Including the quarantine it lasted, I think,

1 Many Russian children attend all-day pre-school institutions. The creche accepts children from approximately the age of three months to three years. 661

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three weeks. ... I don't even remember. And that's the way it always is?when one of them is over it, the other one is right in the middle of the illness. And what else can there be, I wonder, afraid for the children, afraid for my work. Measles, mumps, German measles . . . and, most of all, the flu and colds, colds: from a hat that wasn't well tied, from crying outdoors, from wet pants, from the cold floor, from drafts. . . . The doctor's note says: ARI?"acute respiratory infection." The doctors are in a hurry. I am also in a hurry, so we take the children out though they are still coughing; and their noses don't stop running till summer. Who thought up this questionnaire? What is it for? Where did it come from? I turn it every which way but I don't find any infor mation about its compilers. I look at Dark Lusya and motion with my eyes: "Let's step out." But Blonde Lusya gets up immediately too, and so there are three of us out in the hall. Which is unfortu nate. I wanted so much to talk with Lusya Markoryan about the morning conversation, about my work, about the questionnaire? about everything all at once. Luska is a good soul, but I am not going to talk in front of her. She is a chatterbox; as soon as she has any information, she is ready to burst. Markoryan immediately lights a cigarette, and, blowing a puff of smoke at us, challenges: "Well?" This means, "What do you think of the questionnaire?" I under stand. But Blonde Lusya is indignant. "What do you mean, 'well'? She doesn't know anything. She was late." "Yes, late," Dark Lusya says with mocking sympathy. She puts her hand, thin as a bird's claw, on my shoulder: "Can't you be on time, Olenka, eh?" "These, well . . . demographers came to see us," Luska hurries to spill out the news, "and said that they will use the questionnaire as an experiment in several other female institutes and enter prises. . . ." "Strictly speaking, ours is a male institute, but with a female laboratory," interjects Dark Lusya. "Lay off!" Luska brushes her away. "And then, if the experiment proves successful, they will use this questionnaire all over Moscow." "What do they mean by 'successful'?" I ask Dark Lusya. "And, in general, what is it that they want?" "The devil knows," she answers, jerking up her sharp chin. "Ques tionnaires are in style today. Actually, they want to find the answer to an important question: why don't women want to have babies?" "Lusya, they didn't say that!" Blonde Lusya is indignant. 662

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"Yes, they did. Only they called it: Insufficient rate of population growth.' You and I aren't even reproducing the population. Each couple should have two children, or maybe even three, and we each have only one. . . ." (Here Lusya remembers that Blonde Lusya is a "single mother.") "You're all right?they won't dare de mand anything of you. Olya's all right too?she fulfilled her plan. But what about me? They'll hand me a plan and then?good-bye my dissertation." They're talking and I'm looking at them, thinking: Lusya Mar koryan looks like a charred log, Ludmilka looks like a fluffy white sheep; but if they're to be judged according to the questionnaire, then the former is the best off and the latter is the most unfortunate of the four "mamas" in our laboratory. We all know about each other. Dark Lusya's husband has a doc toral degree in the sciences. They have recently moved into a large cooperative apartment; they have plenty of money; five-year old Markusha has a nanny. What more could you ask for? But, actually, it's like this: for the last five years the scientist has been plaguing Lusya: she is an egotist, she's ruining the child, entrusting his up bringing to old women strangers (he does not allow her to enroll the child in nursery school). Lusya is constantly looking for an other pensioner to "baby-sit." The scientist insists that Lusya leave her job. He wants a second child, and, in general, "a normal family." Blonde Lusya has no husband. Vova's father, a captain, having come from out of town to study at a military academy, concealed from Luska the fact that he already had a family. She found out about it a little too late. When Luska told the captain that she was in her fourth month, he disappeared, vanished. Luska's mother, arriving from the country, almost killed her daughter at first, then went to complain about the captain "to the very most important chief," then cried together with Luska, swore at and cursed all men, and ended by staying in Moscow; now she takes care of her grandson and keeps house. She requires of her daughter only that she do the shopping and the heavy laundry, and that she come home to sleep every night, without fail. We know the least about Shura. Her little boy is in the fifth grade. After school, before his mother comes, he is home alone. He categorically refuses to attend the extended-day school; he takes care of himself. In the course of the day Shura calls home several times: "Did you eat well? You didn't forget to turn off the gas? Don't forget to lock the door when you go out to play! . . ." (His key is on a string, sewn onto his jacket.) "Are you doing your home work? Don't get carried away by your reading." A serious boy! 663

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Shura's husband drinks. She hides it, but we guessed it a long time ago. We don't ask her about her husband. I guess of all of us I am the most fortunate. Bi?mming with curiosity, Blonde Lusya takes Lusya Markoryan's wisecrack about "the baby plan" seriously. "What do you mean, 'a plan?" she gasps, and her narrow eye brows fly up to her very curls. "It can't be?! Oh, you are joking?!" There is disappointment in her voice. "Well, of course, you are joking. . . . But, girls, I think that the questionnaire?it's not just for nothing. They'll give us, mothers, some benefits. Eh? Maybe they'll shorten the work day. Maybe they'll start giving us more paid sick leave for the children, not just three days. . . . You'll see. If they're investigating, they'll do something." Blonde Lusya is agitated, she shakes her curls, her round face is flushed. "Oh, you! 'White sheep, white sheep, have you any wool?'" says Dark Lusya, paraphrasing the nursery rhyme. "We don't have enough builders?there aren't enough hands for everything. That's the problem. Do you understand? There's already a shortage of builders. And what's going to happen in the future? In the future, who'll build?" "Build what?" Luska asks with warm interest. "Everything: houses, factories, machines, bridges, roads, rockets, Communism. . . . Everything. And who will defend all this? And who will populate our land?!" I am listening and not listening. The morning conversation be gins to spin around in my head again. "I advise you to get yourself better organized," Yakov said. Maybe everything's already decided and my work is being turned over to Lydia? I'm late; I'm lax. That's bad! And now my sick leave "data" will get to him. It's too bad I didn't get to talk to Lusya Markoryan. But she can see that I'm not myself. Putting her arm around my shoulders and pulling me slightly toward her, she says in a sing-song voice, rock ing together with me: "Don't worry, Olya, they won't fire you. . . ." "They wouldn't dare fire her," Blonde Luska boils up suddenly, like milk on the stove, "with two children? And besides, first they'd have to write out a reprimand and you've only had one rebuke." That was for lateness also. I feel ashamed?Luska is so kind, so responsive, and I didn't want to discuss my problems in front of her. "You see, girls, I'm afraid, I'm always afraid, that I won't get the tests done on time. The deadline is a month from now. . . ." "Oh, please don't be so neurotic," Lusya Markoryan cuts me off. 664

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"What do you mean, 'don't be so neurotic,'" Luska pounces on her. "You see a person suffering. . . . You should say to her, 'Calm down, don't be upset.' You really are suffering for nothing, Olya. Honest to God! You'll see?everything!! turn out all right. . . ." These simple words suddenly put a lump in my throat. That's all I need now?to burst out crying. Dark Lusya comes to the rescue. "Listen, beauties," she says, energetically slapping us on the shoulders. "How about our making a triple exchange? Lusya takes my apartment, I move to Olga's, Olga to Lusya's." "Well, and then?" we don't understand. "No, that's wrong. . . ." Lusya Markoryan moves her finger through the air. "No, like this: Olya moves to my place, I move to Luska's, and Lusya to Olya's. Then it'll work out right." "You want to exchange your three-room apartment for my room in a communal flat?" Blonde Lusya says with a bitter smile. "No, I don't want to, but ... I must. I lose space and conveni ences. . . . You have no bath? You do? But then I gain something else, more important. You, Blondie, won't lose out either?Olya's Dima is wonderful. My Suren will be happy?Olya is younger, and I think, fatter than I. . . . And I need a grandmother, oh, how I need her! Well, what do you say? Save the poor graduate student!" "Oh, you," Blonde Lusya shouts, flaring up angrily. "You can't talk seriously about anything!" And she turns sharply in order to leave, but just then the door flings open and she almost crashes into Marya Matveyevna. "Comrades, you are making so much noise," says Marya Matve yevna in a bass voice, "that you are interfering with work. Has something happened?" I grab Blonde Lusya's hand, and just in time; she is already suck ing in enough air to spill out in one breath our whole conversation to M.M. (That's what we call Marya Matveyevna among ourselves.) We all respect Marya Matveyevna. We like her spiritual purity. But it's impossible to discuss serious subjects with her. We know in advance everything she is going to say. We consider her an old time "idealist": we feel she's become somewhat . . . well, abstract. She simply knows nothing about everyday life. She soars high above it, like a bird. Her biography is exceptional: a work commune at the beginning of the thirties; in the forties?political work at the front. She lives alone, her daughters were raised in a children's home, they've long since had children of their own. Marya Matveyevna is occupied only with work?professional work, Party work. She is past seventy. We respect M.M. for her long public service; how could we do otherwise? 665

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"So what's going on here?" asks Marya Matveyevna sternly. "Oh, we're giving it to Olenka," Dark Lusya smiles. "For what cause?" "For lateness. . . ." Luska adds hurriedly; she shouldn't have. Marya Matveyevna shakes her head reproachfully: "You expect me to believe that. ..." I become uncomfortable and I see that both Lusyas do also. You don't act that way with M.M. "You see, Marya Matveyevna," I say, quite sincerely, although I'm not answering her question. "It's so strange: I have two chil dren and I . . . well, I feel embarrassed. . . . For some reason I'm uncomfortable?twenty-six years old and two children?as though it's. . . ." "A pre-revolutionary left-over. . . ." prompts Dark Lusya. "What are you saying, Lusya!" says Marya Matveyevna, indig nant. "Olya, stop imagining things. You should be proud that you are a good mother and at the same time a good worker. You are a real Soviet woman!" M.M. speaks, and I ask, silently, of course, why should I be proud? Am I really such a good mother, is it right to praise me as a worker, and what exactly does the concept "a real Soviet woman" entail?! It is useless to ask Marya Matveyevna this. She won't answer. We reassure M.M. by saying that I'm simply in that kind of mood, and it will, of course, pass. Everyone comes back into the room. I didn't even get proper information about the questionnaire?when and where is it to be returned? But immediately I get a note: "The questionnaires will be collected next Monday from us in person. They want to know our opinion. They might have questions. And what about us? Lusya M." Thanks, and that's enough about the questionnaire. I find Friday in the journal and write out on a sheet of paper the latest experiments?for Lusya Markoryan. Then I find a large sheet of paper, the size of a newspaper, and rule it up according to speci fications. This will be the summary chart of all the tests we've done. It's compiled from the data in our journal. The first fiberglass plastic compound exhibited a high degree of brittleness. We worked out a new binder formula. Then we began a second series of tests. Again everything from the beginning: water absorption, moisture resistance, resistance to heat and to tempera ture change, fire resistance. I never imagined that such thorough ness, care, and attention could be lavished on . . . sewer pipes and roofs. 666

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Long ago Dark Lusya and I had a talk along these lines. I con fessed that I had dreamed of getting into a different kind of labora tory. Lusya laughed. "Young people are sharp, they all want to work on space, and who will take care of our life here on earth?" And then suddenly she asked, "Have you never lived in a house where dirty water leaked out of old rusty pipes onto people's heads and where ceilings collapsed?" It turned out that we had both lived in just such houses. But I guess I had never given it much thought. The more I worked with the new fiberglass plastic, the more fas cinated I became with it. Now I can't wait to finish the testing of the completed compound. How will it stand stresses? How strong will it prove to be? And just at this time there is a bottleneck in the mechanical lab. A bottleneck and a jam. Everything else is going normally. I begin to fill the chart with the data of the physico-chemical tests?they are almost finished. Slowly I line up the columns of figures, turning the pages of the journal. "Moisture resistance. Sample No. 1. . . . Sample No. 2. . . . Sample No. 3. . . . weight in milligrams. . . . time of immersion 3:20 p.m., time of removal 3:20 p.m. = 24 hours. . . . weight after removal. . . ." The fingers of my left hand are holding down the ruler on the proper page; my right hand is writing the figures?the average computed from the results of the three experiments?into the table. I must concentrate; I must not make any errors. "Olya, Olya," a quiet voice calls me. "It's ten to two, I'm leaving, tell me what you need." Today it's Shura's turn to shop for the "mamas." We made up this rule?to buy food for everybody at the same time. And we begged the lunch hour from 2:00 to 3:00, when the stores are less crowded. I order butter, milk, a kilo of bologna, and also a loaf of bread?to eat here. I won't go out to lunch, I'll work?I lost so much time today. Dark Lusya has disappeared somewhere; probably also making up for lost time. Right! She reappears ten minutes before the end of the lunch hour. Her dress and her hair smell as though of lac quer, the familiar smell of our compound. She's hungry as a beast and we eat half of my bologna, dividing the loaf of bread between us; we wash down our dinner with water from the laboratory sink. I become engrossed in the chart again. The second half of the day passes so quickly and imperceptibly that I do not immediately understand why the "quiet" room has suddenly become so noisy. It turns out everybody's already preparing to go home. Again the bus, and again it's overcrowded, then the metro, the jumble at Belorussia Station, where I change trains. And again I 667

This content downloaded from 152.23.0.181 on Fri, 10 Jan 2020 16:38:35 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms The Massachusetts Review must hurry, hurry, I mustn't be late: my family are home by seven. I'm riding the metro in comfort?standing in the corner by a closed door. Standing and yawning. I'm yawning so much that a young man next to me is compelled to ask: "Miss, I'm curious, what were you doing last night?" "Rocking my children to sleep," I answer to get rid of him. As I yawn, I recall what happened this morning. A Monday morning. At a quarter to six the telephone rings. It rings for a long time?must be long distance. No one answers. I don't want to get up either. No, it's the doorbell. A telegram? Maybe it's from Aunt Vera?maybe she's coming to visit us unexpectedly? I dash into the front hall. The telegram is lying on the floor, already unsealed, but it contains not one word, only perforations, as on a computer card. I float smoothly over the mute telegram and turn around in order to get back into bed. ... It is only now that I realize that what is ringing is the alarm clock, and I say to it, "Shoot yourself." It immediately becomes silent. It becomes very, very quiet in the room. It is dark. Dark and quiet. A quiet darkness. A dark quiet ness. . . . But I jump up, dress quickly, all the hooks on my belt fit into their eyes, and, oh, a miracle!?even the one that had come off is there. I run into the kitchen to put up the tea kettle and the water for the macaroni. And again a miracle: the gas burners are aflame, the water in the pot is boiling, the kettle is already singing. It is whistling like a bird, tweet, tweet, tweet. . . . And suddenly I realize: it is not the kettle whistling, it is my nose. But I cannot wake up. Now Dima begins to shake me; I feel the palm of his hand on my back. He is rocking me and saying: "Olka, Olka, Olya, wake up, already! You will be running like a madwoman again." Now I really get up: I dress slowly, the belt hooks get into the wrong eyes, and one is missing. I go to the kitchen, I trip on the rubber mat in the front hall, and I almost fall. There is no gas in the burner, the match goes out, burning my fingers. Oh! I forgot to turn on the switch. Finally I'm in the bathroom. After washing my face I bury it in a warm terry towel, sort of doze off for just a half a second, and awake with the words: "Damn it all!" But that's nonsense. There's nothing to damn?everything's fine, eveiything's wonderful. We were given an apartment in a new house, Kotka and Gulenka are marvelous children, Dima and I love each other, I have an interesting job. There is absolutely nothing to damn anywhere for any reason. Nonsense! 668

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Today I get up normally?at ten past six I am all ready, only my hair is not combed. I peel potatoes?in preparation for dinner?stir the cereal, put up the coffee, warm up the milk, awaken Dima, and go to wake up the children. I turn on the light in the nursery, and say loudly, "Good morning, my pets!" but they go on sleeping. I tap Kotka, shake Gulka, then pull off their covers: "UP!" Kotya gets on his knees and buries his face in his pillow. I pick up Gulka; she tries to fight me off with her feet, and begins to yell. I call Dima?to help?but he is shaving. I leave Kotka. I slip an under shirt, tights, and a dress on Gulka, who has gone Hmp and is sliding off my lap onto the floor. Something is hissing in the kitchen ?oh, I forgot to turn off the gas under the milk! I put Gulka down on the floor and run into the kitchen. Dima comes out of the bathroom, looking handsome and freshly shaved. "Oh, you," he says to me reproachfully. I have no time, so I keep still. Abandoned Gulka starts up with fresh strength. Finally, her yells wake up Kotya. I give Gulka her shoes, she calms down, and begins to fuss with them around her chubby feet, groaning and puffing. Kotya dresses himself, but so slowly that I can't wait. I help him and comb my hair at the same time. Dima sets the table for breakfast. He can't find the bologna in the refrigerator and calls me. While I run to Dima, Gulka steals my comb and hides it. I have no time to look for it. I pin up my half combed hair, wash the children more or less, and we sit down to breakfast. The children have milk and bread, Dima eats, but I can't, I only have coffee. It is already ten minutes to seven and Dima is still eating. It is time to dress the children?quickly, both at the same time, so they won't get perspired. "Let me finish my coffee," grumbles Dima. I put the children on the couch, drag over the whole pile of clothes, and work for two: socks and socks; a pair of snowpants, and another; a sweater and a sweater, a kerchief and a kerchief, mittens and . . . "Dima, where are Kotka's mittens?" Dima answers, "How should I know?" but dashes to look for them and finds them in an unlikely place?the bathroom. He tossed them in there himself last night. I shove two pairs of feet into felt boots and pull two hats on two bobbing little heads. I am rushing and yelling at the children as one yells harnessing horses: "Stay still, stay still, I tell you!" Now Dima joins us, puts on their coats, ties 669

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their scarves and belts. I get dressed, One boot doesn't fit; aha, here is my comb! Finally we go out. Our last words to each other: "Did you lock the door?" "Do you have money?" "Don't run like a madwoman." "All right, don't be late for the children" (this I yell from the bot tom of the stairs)?and we part. It is five past seven, and I am running, of course. From a dis tance, from the top of my little hill, I can see how quickly the bus line is growing, and I fly, waving my arms so as not to fall on the slippery path. The buses arrive full; about five people get on from the head of the line, then a few brave ones dash over from the tail end; the lucky one grabs the handrail, the bus puffs, roars, and moves, and long after it leaves, a foot, a coattail, or a briefcase sticks out the closed doors. Today I am among the brave ones. I recall my student years when I was a runner and a jumper, Olya-alley-oop. I slide along the ice, jump, and grab the handrail, and I pray that someone strong will grab the handrail from behind me, and push me inside. And that's just what happens. When we shake down a bit, I manage to pull out of my bag a copy of Yunost.2 I read a grotesque story by Aksenov,3 long since read by everybody, about a shopworn crate of barrels. I don't understand everything in it, but it makes me laugh and puts me in a good mood. I read even on the escalator, and finish the last page at the bus stop at the Donskoy. I get to the institute on time. First of all, of course, I run to Valya's, at the mechanical lab. She is angry: "Why do you keep running here? I told you, in the second half of the week." "That's tomorrow?" "No, the day after tomorrow." She is right. Of course, it would be better not to keep running there. But the others keep ranning, and it is frightening to think that you might miss some "opening." 1 go up to my lab. I ask Blonde Lusya to prepare for tomorrow the samples for testing in the electrical lab. I sit down to work on the summary chart again. At half past twelve I go to the library to exchange journals and catalogs. Systematically, I go through the new American and English pub lications on construction materials?at our library always, and at other libraries?the Lenin, the scientific-technical, and the patent whenever I can get there. I am glad that I studied English serious

2 Yunost (Youth)?a literary magazine. 3 Vasily Aksenov (or Aksyonov)? a contemporary Russian writer. 670

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ly as far back as high school. To leaf through the journals for about twenty minutes after two or three hours' work?is a rest and a plea sure. I show Lusya Markoryan and Yakov Petrovich everything of interest to our laboratory. Yakov is "English" also, but he's not so good as I. Today in the library I have time to look through "Construction Materials?'68," to familiarize myself with the new issues of the abstracts, and to leaf through the catalog of an American company. I look at the clock?it is five minutes to two. I forgot to leave my "food order"! I run to my lab. On the way I remember that I never did comb my hair and I burst out laughing. Out of breath, with my hair a mess, I fly into our room, and I find myself in the center of a gather ing?the room is full of people. A conference? A meeting? I forgot? "Here, now, ask Olya Voronkova, by what interests she was guided," says Alia Sergeyevna to Zinaida Gustavovna. I see by their faces that a heated discussion is going on. About me? Perhaps I did something wrong? "We are having an argument about this questionnaire," Marya Matveyevna explains to me. "Zinaida Gustavovna has raised an interesting question: would a woman, a Soviet woman, of course, be guided by the interests of society in such a matter as having children?" "And you want to ask me and thus settle the argument," I an swer, calming down. (And I thought it had something to do with my work.) Of course, I am the chief authority on questions of childbearing, but I am tired of that. Besides, Zinaida's "interesting question" is simply stupid, even if one could believe that it was asked in good faith. But, knowing Zinaida, with her constant insinuations and insidious remarks, one must conclude that her question is malevo lent, and that Zinaida means to spite somebody. She herself is at that happy age when one no longer bears children. Shura explains to me in an undertone that the argument sprang up around the fifth question in the questionnaire: "If you have no children, then for what reason: medical reasons, living conditions, family situation, personal considerations, etc. (Underline your reason)." I don't understand why there should be any arguing when each person can avoid the question by underlining "personal considera tions." I would even underline "etc." But everyone found the fifth question interesting, and those who had no children were even offended. Alia Sergeyevna called it "monstrously tactless." 671

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Shura disagreed: "No more so than all the rest of the question naire." Blonde Lusya, having retained from yesterday's conversation the most alarming point ("who will populate our land"), threw herself to the defense of the questionnaire: "But we have to find the way out of our serious and even danger ous situation?the demographic crisis." Lydia, my competitor for the position of junior scientist, who has two suitors, said: "Let those who are married liquidate the crisis." Varvara Petrovna, calm and benevolent, corrects Lydia: "If the problem is of significance to society as a whole, then it concerns everyone ... up to a certain age." Dark Lusya shrugs her shoulders: "Is it worth arguing over such a useless thing as this question naire?" Several voices are heard at once: "Why useless?" Lusya argues that since the authors suggest essentially personal motives as reasons for childlessness, they recognize that each fam ily's decision to have a child is guided by personal considerations; therefore, "no demographic investigation will succeed in affecting this matter." "But you are forgetting 'the living conditions'?look," I protest. Marya Matveyevna, displeased with Lusya's skeptical remark, says: "A tremendous amount has been done in our country towards the emancipation of woman, and there is no reason to doubt further aspirations to do even more." "Perhaps the best results would be achieved by a narrow-practi cal approach to the problem," says Dark Lusya. "In France the government pays the mother for each child. . . . Perhaps that is more effective than all the questionnaires." "Pays? Like on a pig farm?!" Alia Sergeyevna twists her mouth squeamishly. "Watch your words," M.M.'s masculine voice is heard simultane ously with Luska's squeaky one: "For you pigs and people are the same?!" "But that's in France; they have capitalism there," Lydia shrugs her shoulders. I am tired of all this noise. It's late. I'm terribly hungry. It's time for one of the "mamas" to go food shopping. And, finally, I really do have to go and comb my hair! Anyway, I've had enough of this questionnaire. I raise my hand?"your attention, please "?and strike a pose. 672

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"Comrades! Give the floor to the mother of many children! I as sure you that I have had my two children with national considera tions in mind exclusively. I challenge all of you to competition and hope that you will beat me in the quantity as well as the quality of production! And now?I beg you!?somebody give me some bread. . . ." I thought I would make them laugh and thus end all arguments. But someone was offended, and a real squabble began. Poisonous remarks flew from all sides. Voices were raised, drowning out one another. Only scraps of phrases could be heard: ". . . to turn an important matter into a circus," "... if the animal instinct prevails over reason . . . ," "childless people are all egotists," ". . . they ruin their own lives," "it's an open question, whose life is ruined," ". . . you chose to increase the population voluntarily ...,""... and who'll pay you your pension if there's a shortage in the younger generation," ". . . the only real woman is the one who can have children . . . ," and even "... he who climbed into a noose should keep still . . ."! And in all this chaos two sober voices?the angry one of Marya Matveyevna: "This is not an argument; it is bedlam," and the calm one of Varvara Petrovna, "Comrades, what are you all so excited about; after all, each one of you chose her own lot. . . ." It becomes quieter and then Zinaida's petty little soul reveals it self in a shriek: "Maybe they chose their own, but when you have to take their shift, or take their turn traveling to factories all over, or kill whole evenings sitting at meetings, then it's our business too." With this ended our woman talk about the questionnaire and childbearing. And suddenly I felt sorry: we could have had a seri ous talk; yes, it would have been very interesting to have a real talk.

On the way home I am still thinking about this conversation. . . . "Each one chose her own lot. . . ." Do we really make free choices? I remember how Gulka came about. Of course, we did not want a second child. Kotka was still very little then. He wasn't even a year and a half when I realized that I was pregnant again. I was horrified. I cried. I applied for an abor tion. But I felt different?not the same as when I was pregnant with Kotka?better, and just different. I told this to an older woman who was waiting in line next to me at the clinic. And suddenly she said: "That's not because it's your second. It's because this one is a girl." I left immediately. I came home and I said to Dima: "I am going 673

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to have a girl. I don't want an abortion." He was outraged: "Why do you listen to old wives' tales?" and tried to persuade me not to be a fool and to go make an appointment. But I believed it and began to imagine a little girl, blonde and blue-eyed like Dima (Kotya is chestnut-haired and brown-eyed like me). I saw the little girl running around in a short skirt, shaking her funny-looking braids, and rocking a doll. Dima would get angry when I told him what I was imagining, and we would quarrel. The last possible moment came. We had a final discussion. I said: "I cannot kill my daughter just because it would be easier for us to five," and began to cry. "Don't howl, you Utile fool, go ahead, have the baby if you are so insane, but you'll see, you'll have an other boy!" Here Dima stopped short, looked at me for a long time in silence, and then, striking the palm of his hand on the table, put forth a resolution: "And so, it is decided?we are having the baby; enough howling and quarreling." Then he put his arms around me. "And, say, Olka, another boy?that wouldn't be so bad either?keep Kostya company." But Gulka came, and she was so pretty, right from the start?blonde, fair, looking so much like Dima it was funny. I had to leave my job at the factory where I had been only half a year. (I had stayed home for a year with Kotka. I almost forfeited my diploma.4) Dima got a second job?teaching evenings at a tech nician. Again we were counting pennies, eating dried codfish, mil let, and bologna. I nagged Dima for buying expensive cigarettes. Dima blamed me for his not getting enough sleep. We sent Kotya to the creche again (I couldn't manage alone with the two of them), but he was ill constantly, and, mostly, stayed home. Did I choose this? No, of course I didn't. Do I regret it? No, never. It's not even a question that can be asked. I love them so much, our silly little fools. And so I rush?hurry, hurry?to them. I run, the shopping bags filled with groceries swing back and forth and bump against my knees. I'm in the bus, and it is already seven o'clock by my watch. They're home already. ... If only Dima doesn't let them stuff them selves with bread; if only he doesn't forget to put the potatoes on the stove. I run along the paths, cut across the empty lots, fly up the stairs. . . . Just as I thought?the children are munching bread. Dima forgot everything?he's deep in technical journals. I turn on

4 In the Soviet professional world the graduate of a higher educational institution must work for three years in his or her specialty; otherwise, the diploma may be forfeited. 674

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all the burners: I put up the potatoes, the tea, the milk; I throw the hamburger patties on the frying pan. Twenty minutes later we're eating. We eat a great deal. I am having my first real meal of the day. Dima's lunch at the cafeteria wasn't that filling. The children?who knows what they had to eat? The children are drowsy from all this warm food, they're already holding up their heads with their fists, their eyes clouded with sleep. They have to be pulled quickly into the tub under the warm spray, and put into their beds. By nine they're asleep. Dima returns to the table. He likes to have his tea in peace, look over the newspaper, read a little. And I do the dishes, then wash the children's clothes?the extra pants Gulka takes to the creche, dirty aprons, handkerchiefs. I mend Kotka's tights?he's always go ing through the knees. I prepare all the clothes for the morning, put Gulka's extra things into a small bag. And now Dima is dragging in his coat?a button got torn off in the metro again. The kitchen still has to be swept, the garbage taken out. This last is Dima's job. At last everything is done and I go to take a shower. I do this every night, even if I am so tired I'm ready to drop. I get into bed after eleven. Dima has already made up our bed on the couch. Now he goes into the bathroom. My eyes are already closed when I remember that I still didn't sew the hook on my belt. But no power on earth could drag me out from under the covers. Two minutes later I am asleep. In my sleep I can still hear Dima getting into bed, but I cannot open my eyes, I cannot answer some question he is asking, I cannot kiss him back when he kisses me. . . . Dima winds the alarm clock. In six hours the infernal machine will explode. I don't want to hear the grinding of the clock spring and I sink through the couch into a deep, dark, and warm sleep.

Wednesday After yesterday's "bedlam" everyone is a little uncomfortable and exaggeratedly polite; everyone is working with great concentration. I take the tests journal and go to meet Luska at the electrical lab. She's already there. She's flirting with the new laboratory techni cian, oohing and ahing as she looks at the fearful signs: "Danger! High tension!" as though she sees them for the first time. This is not our "home"?we are only visitors here. Our samples, lying since yesterday in a constant temperature-humidity chamber, are now placed into an apparatus to measure electrical resistance. Six slabs, one after the other for resistance along the surface; and six others for resistance through the slab. 675

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Luska, pretending that she is afraid?"it might kill you"?backs up to the door and quietly slips away, unnoticed. She amazes me: she works well with her hands; show her something once?she re members it. But she will not get involved. I tried to explain the calculations to her, to show her the formulas. She says, "I know it all already: heat resistance so the pipes won't melt; spark resistance so lightning won't make a hole in the roof." She is sorry that she went to our technicum.5 She loves to sew, she wanted to study to be a cutter, but she's afraid: "Who'd marry a seamstress nowa days?" Today it's my turn to shop for food during lunch hour. Buying food for everybody is not an easy job. Not only because it's heavy to carry. But also because you will definitely be yelled at by people on line, even if it's a very short line. You buy some bologna, and then some more, and some more. . . . Then the remarks begin: "Are you buying for a luncheonette?" "She's taking care of her whole building, while we're waiting here. . . ." Here in Moscow everyone is always in a hurry. Even those who aren't going any where. The "hurry-up" current charges up everyone in turn. In the stores it is best to keep still. In the delicatessen department, looking gloomy and sullen, I buy three half-kilos of butter, six bottles of milk, three bottles of butter milk, ten pieces of processed cheese, two kilos of bologna, and two 300-gram packages of cottage cheese. The line bears this patiently, but towards the end someone feigns a sigh: "And they all complain they're short of money." In the semi-prepared foods department I load up some more with four dozen hamburger patties and six rib steaks. Some size shop ping bags! And, loaded with these bags, I suddenly turn off the road back to the lab, wind in and out among the buildings, and come out to the glass box of a hairdresser shop. I still have twenty minutes. I'll get my hair cut short! That used to be very becoming to me. There is no fine. To the sound of the cloakroom attendant's fierce grumbling, I leave my bags on the floor next to the coat racks, walk upstairs, and immediately sit down in the chair of a youngish woman with shaved eyebrows. "What are we having done?" she asks, and hearing that I only want a haircut she purses her lips. "Well, now, she is going to chop it off. . . ." That's just what she does. I look in the mirror: stubby hair bristles at the cheeks; the head looks like an isosceles triangle. I am close to tears, but for some reason I give her thirty kopecks

5 A trade school for para-professional training. 676

This content downloaded from 152.23.0.181 on Fri, 10 Jan 2020 16:38:35 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms A Week Like Any Other Week above the fee, and go down to the coat room. The attendant says, "Hmm," and, pushing aside my hand with the coat-check, calls out: "Lyonka, come here a minute!" A young man appears in a white coat. "Here, Lyonya," the attendant says with compassion. "They gave this girl a haircut upstairs. Could you fix her?" Lyonya looks me over with a frown and nods towards the empty chairs in the barber shop. I don't resist?it can't get worse. "For your face I suggest a boy cut?you don't object?" Lyonya asks. "Go ahead," I whisper, and close my eyes. Lyonya clicks with the scissors, muttering something to himself, raising and lowering my head with a light touch of his fingers, then chirps with the clippers, fluffs the hair with the comb, and finally, taking off my sheet, says: "You can open your eyes." I open my eyes and I suddenly see a cute young girl. I smile at her and she smiles back at me. Lyonya smiles too. I look at him and see that he is admiring his work. "Well, how is it?" he asks. "Marvelous, you are simply a magician!" "I am simply a master," he answers. Thrusting a ruble into Lyonya's pocket I look at the time and I gasp?it is already three-twenty. "Are you late?" Lyonya asks sympathetically. "Next time come earlier." "Definitely!" I exclaim. "Thank you!" All out of breath I run into the laboratory?of course, the chief has been looking for me. He is in the library, has asked that I drop by. Everyone oohs and ahs, seeing my head, but I have no time; grabbing a notebook and a pencil I fly out of the room. I run through the corridors and try to think of a lie to tell the chief if he asks where I was. Then I realize?it's useless; as soon as he looks at me he'll see everything. I enter the reading room; he is sitting over a book and writing. "Yakov Petrovich, you were looking for me." "Yes, Olga Nikolayevna, sit down." One look at me?the chief smiles. "You are looking very much younger, if one can say this of a woman your age. ... I wanted to ask you, if it isn't too much trouble, to translate one page for me here," he hands me a book, "and I will take notes." I begin to read the article aloud in Russian, but he asks that I read the English text as well. Now and then he asks me to repeat. 677

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Suddenly I see Luska outside the glass door. She is making unin telligible signs to me: motioning as though turning a key in a door, then raising two fingers spread apart, and rolling her eyes. I wave her away. It's embarrassing, after all. Luska disappears. But I am beginning to worry?something must have happened there. We are crawling along toward the end of the excerpt (and it wasn't just one page, but more like three), but the chief asks that I repeat everything from the beginning quickly in Russian. And I am sitting on pins and needles. I have to get to Valya's in the mechanical lab, I have to find out what Luska was trying to tell me. Finally we finish; the chief thanks me; relieved, "Thank you," I reply and run into the old building. Luska is waiting for me in the old building on the first floor landing. She has bad news: from "the most dependable sources" she has learned that next week the mechanical lab will be working on a special order. "How do you know?" "I know, I know, don't ask me how." Luska makes a mysterious face. "I know firsthand." "Firsthand!" Oh, Luska! Anyway, it doesn't matter?I have to hurry to Valya's. "Don't say anything to her!" Luska shouts after me. I have to push Valya harder, otherwise we'll get stuck altogether. And if you get stuck in December?you're finished. It's the end of the year, fulfillment of the plan, reports, and all that. And in order for the work to proceed, we have to know how the second com pound performed?did the durability of the fiberglass plastic in crease? In the mechanical laboratory there is a cheerful din. In the small office, instead of Valya, little Gorfunkel from the wood slab labora tory is sitting and working. No, it turns out he is not working but looking for his glasses, his balding head almost touching the top of the table and his short hands poking about in a pile of papers like a turtle in the hay. I find his glasses and hand them to him. He does not know where Valya is. She is out. "Has she been out long?" "Yes!" I go back to my lab; on the way I look into all the labs. There is no Valya anywhere. Can she be hiding? A quarter of an hour before the end of the workday people crowd into our room. Zinaida is distributing theatre tickets. Our group is going to see Bulgakov's "Flight" at the Yermolova Theatre. "Going out to the theatre"?that's not for me, not for the two of us. I begin to feel sad. We haven't been to the theatre in ... I try 678

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to recall the last time we went anywhere, and I can't. I was a fool not to have ordered a ticket. At least Dima could have gone alone; we can never go together, anyway. Dima's mother takes care of her daughter's children and lives at the other end of Moscow; my mother is dead; Aunt Vera, with whom I lived after my father remarried, has remained in Leningrad; and my Moscow aunt, Sonya, is terribly afraid of children. There's nobody to sit for us, what can you do? . . .

I come out of the institute. It just stopped snowing. The snow is still lying on the sidewalks. Everything looks white. Evening. The orange rectangles of the windows hang suspended over the blue shrubbery. The air is pure and fresh. I decide to walk part of the way. In the little park along the walls of the Donskoy Monastery the streetlights illuminate the down-covered branches of trees, the snow-covered benches. Where there are no lights, a thin sliver of the new moon can be seen through the treetops. Suddenly I am overwhelmed by the longing to walk unencum bered, without a load, without a goal. Simply to walk?not rushing, quietly, very slowly. To walk along Moscow's winter boulevards and streets, to stop at the store windows, to look at the photographs, books, shoes, to read the announcements unhurriedly, thinking of where I would like to go, to lick an ice cream bar slowly, and on some square, under a clock, peering into the crowd, to wait for Dima. This all did happen, but so long ago, so terribly long ago, that it seems to me that it was not I but some other she. It was like this: she saw him, he saw her, and they fell in love with each other. There was a big party at the construction institute?a get-together for alumni and upperclassmen. It was a noisy, fun-filled evening, with quiz games, jokes, charades, masks, jazz, noisemakers, and dancing in the hot, crowded hall. She performed gymnastics?she twirled around a hoop, leaped, twisted, whirled. They clapped for a long time. The boys yelled: "O-lya, O-lya!" and then, one after another, they asked her to dance. He did not dance, but stood there?big, broad-shouldered?leaning against a wall, following her with his eyes. She noticed him: "What a nice lunk.'" Then, passing him once more: "What does he look like? A polar bear? A seal?" And the third time: "A white seal; a white seal out of a fairy-tale." But he just kept looking at her, and did not invite her to dance. With her every movement she answered his look; she was happy, gay, she whirled about without stopping, and never got tired. 679

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When they announced "the white dance" she ran up to him, con fetti spilling from her short hair. "He probably doesn't dance." But he danced well and was light on his feet. Her friends tried to sepa rate them, they called: "O-lya, O-lya, come-to-us!" They tried to lasso her with streamers, but succeeded only in weaving and tan gling and tying them together with paper ribbons. He walked her home, he wanted to see her the next day, but she was leaving for Leningrad. After vacation, for all of February, he appeared every evening in the vestibule, waited for her next to the wall mirror, and walked her to Pushkin Street, where she lived with her aunt. One evening he did not come. He was not there the next day either. Not seeing him at the usual place on the third day, she was sad, hurt. But she could no longer not tliink of him. A few days later he appeared?at the mirror, as always. She flushed, and, starting a conversation with the girls, quickly walked to the exit. He caught up with her in the street, grabbed her tight by the shoulders, turned her towards him, and, ignoring the passers by, pressed his face to her fur hat. "I had to go out of town sud denly. I don't have your phone number or your address. ... I missed you terribly. I beg you, come to my place, to your place, any place you like." They saw a green light flash on a taxi on the corner; they got in and rode silently, holding hands. He lived in a large communal apartment. Inside the entrance, under the telephone, stood an easy chair with torn upholstery. The nearest door immediately opened. An old woman's kerchiefed head popped out, aimed with its eye, and disappeared. Something rustled in the depth of the corridor where the light of the dim and dusty bulb did not reach. She felt sick, she was almost sorry that she went to his place, but she remembered the decorous orderliness of her aunt's house, tea under the old chandelier, and family conver sation around the table. . . . At the end of April they were married. Into his half-empty room with an ottoman and a drawing board used for a table they moved her things: a suitcase, a bundle with bedding, a bunch of books. Before, in her dreams, she had imagined everything quite differ endy: the marble staircase of the wedding palace, Mendelssohn's wedding march, a white dress, a veil, roses, a richly set table with cries of "bitter!"6

6 At wedding parties guests exclaim the words: "Bitter, bitter!" The couple are expected to kiss (to make it sweet). 680

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There was none of this. "A wedding? What do you want that for?" he asked, surprised. "Let's fly instead to far-off lands. . . ." Early in the morning they registered?she came to the marriage bureau with her friend, he with his. He brought her lacy white car nations with long stems. A breakfast prepared by her aunt awaited them. The guests raised their goblets to toast the newlyweds, wished them happiness. Friends went along with them to the bus for the Vnukovo Airport. And six hours later they were in Alupka.7 They stayed in a little old house perched on a mountainside. It was reached by a little path, with steps cut in at the turns. A nar row, paved yard overhung the flat roof of the hut below. A low fence built of native rocks was criss-crossed by tendrils of grapevine climbing up the mountainside. In the yard there was a single tree? an old walnut, half dried out. Some of its branches?bare and grey evoked thoughts of winter, of cold regions; others were thickly covered by dark green toothed leaves. Purple bunches of wisteria winding around the hut hung down over the slits of the narrow windows and filled the yard with an intoxicatingly sweet smell. Inside the hut, it was dark and cool. A small stove, full of cracks, had evidently not been used in a long time. In the evening the land lady, an old Ukrainian woman, brought them from her shack a round three-legged brazier, full of live coals "so as you won't freeze to death in the night." A light blue flame hovered over the coals. They opened the door wide and went out into the yard. It was dark and still. The light from the street lamps did not reach here. The moon had not yet risen. They stood and listened to the sea breathing and the waves crash ing on the large rocks. In the far-off distance a faint light was blink ing?perhaps a lantern on a fisherman's launch, perhaps a campfire on the shore. The breeze blew from the mountains, bringing smells of the forest, of grasses warmed through the day by the sun, of earth. The coals in the brazier were turning dark, getting covered with ash. They put the brazier out in the yard. A black sky penetrated by stars spread over the hut. The dark branches of the walnut tree threw a shadow on the clay roof with the half-fallen chimney. A broken down hearth, a stranger's house? their home for now. And they were alone together, and there was no one else?the night, the sea, the stillness. In the morning they ran down the path, had breakfast at a coffee house, then wandered along the shore. They climbed the steep

7 Alupka-a small town near Yalta, in the Crimea, on the Black Sea. 681

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rocks, warmed themselves in the sun like salamanders, watched the swirling of the water below?the icy spray, bursting, flew up to them. It was quiet, clean, deserted. . . . Stripping down to her bath ing suit, she did gymnastics. He watched how skilfully she did handstands, back bends, how high she jumped; and he kept calling: "Do it again!" Later, when the sea was still, they jumped into the water. The cold stung them, took away their breath. After swimming a little, they jumped onto the shore, and then lay in the sun for a long time. Baked through by the hot sun, they walked to the trees of Voron tsov Park; they wandered along the paths under the shady canopy, filled with birds' whisdes and chirps; they told each other about their childhood, parents, school, friends, the institute. . . . Occasionally they went up into the mountains. Here it was com pletely deserted. The pines stood quiedy, lazily swaying their branches; the tree trunks, warmed by the sun, exuded resin; it smelled of pine needles. From here, from above, the sea looked purple; it rose vertically, like a wall. They lay on the slope, covered with warm dry pine needles; they watched the downy clouds, fluffed by the wind. They jumped up, shedding pine needles, and began to chase each other, snouting and laughing, running in circles and loops through the pine trees. They slid down the slopes made slippery by the pine needles as though coasting down an ice-hill, climbed over the rocks, slipped down steep hillsides grabbing at the shrubbery, and, exhausted, hot, hun gry, tumbled out of the sultry brushwood onto the highway. The pavement brought them to Alupka's narrow streets, crowded in by white walls of houses with red tile roofs, with bushes of jasmine and eglantine under the windows. The sixteen days, collected one by one out of three "legal" days, three holiday days, and ten days begged by her at the institute and by him at work, suddenly came to an end. Early one Sunday morning, carrying a rucksack and a suitcase, he and she got into a bus. They were leaving paradise. This was five years ago.

I shouldn't have taken my time walking, thinking. It's late! I run down the escalator, I bump into people with my bulging shopping bag, but I can t stop. I'm not very late, but all three are already walking around with pieces of bread in their hands. Dima has a guilty look and I don't say a thing, but dash quickly into the kitchen. 682

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Ten minutes later I place on the table a large frying pan with a fluffy omelet and shout: "Come in for supper! Hurry!" The children run into the kitchen, Kotka quickly sits down in his seat, grabs a fork, then looks at me, and yells: "Papa, come here, look, our Mama is a boy!" Dima comes in, smiles: "But you're still so young," and during supper he keeps looking at me, instead of reading, as he usually does. And he washes the dishes with me and even sweeps the floor. "Olka, but you're exactly the same as five years ago!" On account of the occasion, we forget to set the alarm. . . .

Thursday

We jumped out of bed at half-past six. Dima dashed to wake up the children; I flew into the kitchen?just the coffee and the milk!? then to help them. It looked as though we'd be able to get out on time. But suddenly Kotka, after finishing his milk, announced: "I won't go to school." Dima and I, at the same time: "Don't be silly!" "Get dressed!" "It's time to go!" "We are leaving!" "No," he shakes his little head; he puts on a frown; he's ready to cry. I squat down before him: "Kotya, tell Papa and me what happened? What's the matter?" "Maya Mikhaylovna punished me, I won't go." "Punished you? You must have been fooling around, you weren't listening to her. . . ." "No, I wasn't fooling around. And she punished me. I won't go." We started to dress him by force, he began to push and kick, and started to howl. I was repeating over and over: "Kotya, get dressed; Kotya, we have to go. Kotya, Papa and I will be late for work." Finally Dima thought of saying: "Come on, I'll talk to Maya Mikhaylovna, we'll find out what's going on." Kotka?all red, perspiring, covered with tears?tries to tell his story through his sobs: "Vitka pushed, not me. Got all smashed up, and she put me by my-self. ... It wasn't me! It wasn't me!" and again tears. "Who got all smashed up?Vitka?" 683

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"No-o-o, the flowerpot. . . ." I myself am almost in tears?I feel so sorry for my httle boy; he is so hurt; how terrible to have to take him outside by force. And it's scary: he's all perspired, he could catch cold. I beg Dima to find out, without fail, what happened, to tell the teacher how upset Kotya is. "All right, now, both of you, don't you go all to pieces," Dima says sternly. "There are twenty-eight of them there; one can make a mistake." Now suddenly Gulya, calm till the last minute, begins to cry, and stretches her little arms out to me: "I want Mama." I leave them all, shout to Dima from the stairs: "Be sure to call me!" run down, and fly to the bus; I assault the first one, the second one. ... I make it into the third. In the bus I keep thinking about Kotka. There really are twenty eight children in the group, and only one teacher. It's possible, of course, that there might not be enough of her to go around to them all in terms of attention?or even strength. But it's better not to look into things at all, if there isn't time, than to look into them incom pletely, to punish unfairly. . . . I remember, when Kotka was being transferred to our new nur sery school, how the director begged me to take the job of teacher's aide, how she tried to persuade me: "The salary scale is at time and a half; the teacher helps set up the cots, take the bedding down from the shelves, dress the children for outdoor play." It must be plenty rough for them?for both the teacher and the teacher's aide. Just imagine?twenty-five snow pants, kerchiefs, hats; fifty socks, boots, mittens; and then coats, scarves, belts to be tied. . . . And all this has to be put on twice and taken off once; and after naps. . . . Twenty-five. . . . What are these "norms," who thought them up? Undoubtedly those who have no children or whose children don't attend nursery school. . . . I'm in the metro and it suddenly hits me?today is the political education study group, the seminar, and I left my program at home, I even forgot to look at it. ... I volunteered to prepare a ques tion . . . and I forgot! The study group meets once in two months; of course, one can forget. But since I volunteered I had no right to forget. Well, all right, when I get to the laboratory, I'll get Lusya Markoryan's program, maybe I'll think up something. But the first thing I must take care of is the mechanical lab. If I can't push my way in to work there today. ... I look in?Valya is not there. I shout: "Where is Valya?" They don't hear me, they don't understand me, then I don't under 684

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stand them. . . . Finally I get it?Valya went out somewhere. Again! I leave her a note in which everything except for one sentence is a he: "Valechka, darling, save us! We are questioning the durability of the finished compound. Without the tests in your lab everything stops. Y. P. is angry with me. This is the second day I haven't been able to find you in." Upstairs, our lab has only kind people in it. Nobody asks me why I am so late, but everybody wants to take a good look at my new haircut; yesterday they didn't get a chance. I turn every which way?the back, the profile. Then Alia Sergeyevna enters and, say ing with a smile, "Very nice," informs me that Valya has just been asking for me. I fly out into the hall, but I have time to take only a few steps when I am called to the telephone. It is Dima. He reassures me? he told Maya about Kotka. She promised to look into things. This doesn't console me. "That's the way she said it?" "Yes, just this way." "And did you tell her what he said?" "I didn't get to tell her very much, but I said what was most important. . . ." After hanging up I remember that I did not tell Dima about the study group?I'll be home an hour and a half late. And I didn't have time to prepare anything for dinner this morning! And it's not easy to reach Dima by phone in his "cubicle." I'll try to do it later, but now I must hurry to Valya's before somebody gets there ahead of me! Valya is displeased?I didn't come fast enough. She grumbles: "Either they keep running or they don't come when you call them." Today they are having a staff conference: from four o'clock on, all the equipment is free; if you wish to work it yourself?you are welcome. The person for whom that time was saved, canceled. Four o'clock? That's too late! That's only an hour and a half, even if there were no study group. But the seminar starts at 4:45. And I can't ask to be excused from it today since I am scheduled to speak. That means there would be only 45 minutes. I try to ex plain this to Valya, but she does not understand. "You asked for time, so I am giving it to you." "Would it be possible to start at least an hour earlier, at least on one apparatus?" "No, it's impossible." "What should I do?" I am thinking aloud. 685

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"Well, I don't know. You better decide. ... Or I'll give it to some one else. There are many who want it. . . ." "And who comes before?perhaps I can exchange?" "No, don't go setting up any exchange bureau here?this place is a main highway as it is. . . ." "All right, we'll take the time?we'll be here at four." On the way back I am racking my brain?what should I do? Per haps Luska should get excused from the study group and carry out a few experiments? But each sample must be measured with a micrometer, every sample, without fail, even though they are made according to a standard. . . . Will she do it? And will she calculate the area of the cross-section? She does not believe in such meticu lousness. No, leave Luska out of this. Whom else can I ask?Zinaida? But she has most probably forgotten all this. So I have to ask to be excused from the seminar. I am sitting over the journal, making up the summary of yester day's electrical tests, and thoughts are tnrning in my head of how to run away from everybody and work at the physico-mechanical lab till the end of the day. "And where is Lusya Vartanovna?" I ask. Nobody answers. Doesn't anyone know? Well, in that case, I am lost. That means that Dark Lusya "went off to think." On these occasions she knows how to hide in such a way that no one can find her. Suddenly, it's lunch hour. Blonde Lusya bends down towards me saying: "Are you asleep or something? Quick, tell me what you need, you are holding me up. It's two o'clock already." I begin to think aloud, what do I need, and Luska rushes me: "Well, is that all?" "That's all," I answer. "If you haven't got the time, that's all!" "Now what are you so mad about?" Luska says, softening. I'm not mad, I simply don't know what to do. And just at this moment, the telephone rings: "An urgent call for Voronkova to come to the lobby to accept a shipment from the fac tory." I throw two three-ruble bills to Luska: "Get some kind of meat." In the doorway I remember, "And some thing to chew on." (I haven't yet eaten today.) Downstairs, in the lobby, unloaded from the pick-up truck, He three bulky packages marked, "To Polymers, for Voronkova"?the first experimental products manufactured out of fiberglass plastic No. 1 at our experimental factory?roof tiles, thick short pipes. Yakov Petrovich shouldn't have rushed his order?the compound has since been changed. . . . They'll only take up room on the shelves. 686

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I ask the porter where is Yura?our handyman and errand boy. He was just here. Wherever he's needed, he was always "just here." I try to find him by telephone, but I don't have enough time. I take one of the packages and drag it up the stairs to the third floor. The old porter, feeling sorry for me, utters lamentations and swears at Yura. To this accompaniment I quiedy drag all three packages up to our laboratory. While I am dragging the last one, Luska, carrying our purchases, catches up with me. "Olya, they have 'Lotos' soap powder down at the store; I took a place in fine. If somebody would go, she could get some for all of us. . . ." I need the soap powder, I need it badly, but I only wave my hand?I can't think about it now; it's after three; if I can just get to the mechanical lab on time and also, somehow, take a look at the program. Lusya Markoryan isn't here yet. . . . But haven't I already decided?I am going to the mechanical?! I'll eat what Luska brought me and get myself off. But Blondie has disappeared somewhere? perhaps to get the "Lotos"? I look into her bag?two rolls, two pack ages of cream cheese. Half of these must be for me. I get everything ready quietly, our samples are downstairs long since, and five minutes to four I disappear. I begin with the pendulum hammer. I measure the first bar; I secure it. I set the starting angle. I release the weight. Impact! The sample has withstood it. Now we will increase the load. What is this? I'm excited; it's a game of chance. A bet on fiberglass plastic No. 2: will he stand up or won't he? The sample does not break under maximum impact. Hurrah! Or is it too early to shout "Hur rah"? This is not the end of tests for durability. . . . And what about tensile strength? And compression? And hardness? I become engrossed in a fascinating sport in which I am the trainer and Plastic is my trainee. He passed the first round and is getting ready for the second. Again I measure the thickness and the width; again I calculate the area of the cross-section. . . . Now a new apparatus, a new load. . . . After a while I discover a sweet roll and a package of cream cheese on top of the sheet with the calculations. That's interesting! I already ate a roll and a package of cream cheese upstairs. Where did this come from?was Luska here? I hadn't noticed. It is so good to work like this?rhythmically, silendy, alone with your work. But suddenly a sound reaches me?my name is being called as sertively and angrily: "Voronkova! Voronkova!! Voronkova, for heaven's sakes!" I turn around. Lydia is standing at the door. 687

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"The study group is starting. Let's go. And hurry up." After firing this at me she slams the door. I throw the already measured samples back into the box; I also throw into it the micrometer, the pencil, and the sheets of paper with the calculations; and on top I slam down the tests journal. The whole laboratory gathers for the study group?about twenty people; it takes place in a large room next to our lab. I run over to my desk, dump all my belongings, grab a pencil and a notebook, and enter the meeting room with a guilty look. Zachuraev himself is speaking. He's our instructor, a retired lieutenant-colonel. But as soon as I open the door, he stops talking. I say I am sorry and try to make my way to Lusya Markoryan. "Why do you come so late?" Zachuraev is annoyed. "Sit down, here is an empty seat." And he points to the nearest chair. "Let us go on." Zachuraev takes a handkerchief out of his pocket and wipes his hands. That means he will now move on to the new topic. . . . How terrible that I never did tell Dima about the seminar. What will he do with the children? What will he feed them without me? I didn't have time this morning to prepare anything for sup per. . . . How is Kotka and his sufferings? I'm not so sure that Maya Mikhaylovna, if she did "look into things," didn't only hurt him unnecessarily even more. The study group is over. I run back to our lab, grab my bag, and run to the coatroom. The clock in the vestibule is showing a quarter past seven. If I could just grab a taxi, not home, of course, but at least to the metro! But there are no taxis in sight and I run to the trolleybus and then run down the escalator to the metro, then to the bus. . . . And, all perspired and panting, I fly into the house at close to nine o'clock. The children are already asleep, Gulenka in her crib, undressed, and Kotka, dressed, on our couch. In the kitchen, at the table cov ered with dirty dishes, sits Dima. He is examining blueprints in a journal and eating bread and chopped eggplant. On the stove, a tea kettle is boiling furiously, throwing off a plume of steam. "What does this mean?" Dima asks sternly. I tell him briefly what kind of a day I had, but he does not accept my explanations?I should have gotten through to him by phone somehow. He's right; I don't argue. "So what did you feed the children?" It turns out he gave them black bread and chopped eggplant, which they liked very much?"They ate a whole jar?and then he gave them milk to drink. "You should have given them tea," I remark. 688

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"How should I know," Dima growls, and puts his nose back into the journal. "And what about Kotka?" "As you see, he's asleep." "Yes, I see. I mean the nursery school." "Nothing, it passed. He didn't cry any more." "Let's undress him and take him to his bed." "Maybe we'll eat first?" All right, I give in. It's useless to talk with a hungry man. After kissing and covering Kotka (he looks pale and tired to me), I return to the kitchen and make a big omelet with bologna. We eat our supper. The house is a total mess. Everything strewn about in the morn ing rush is still lying around. And on the floor next to the couch is a pile of children's clothes: coats, boots, hats. Dima didn't put them away probably as a sign of protest: don't be late. After the omelet and the strong hot tea Dima is in a better mood. Together we undress our son and put him to bed, put away the children's clothes. Then I go off to the kitchen and the bathroom? to clean up, to wash up, to rinse out. . . . I didn't get to bed till after twelve. And at half past two we were awakened by Gulka's loud crying. She had a stomachache and diarrhea. We had to wash her and change her, change her bedding, shove medicine into her, and put a hot water bag on her belly. "That's your chopped eggplant with milk," I grumbled. "It's all right," Dima reassured me. "It'll go away." Then I sat next to Gulka supporting the hot water bag with my hand and murmuring sleepily, "Lullaby, little rabbits sleep near by." My head was resting on my other hand, propped on the side of the crib. I got into bed close to four; I just closed my eyes?the alarm!

Friday

The first thing in the morning everybody in our room is needling me for not preparing the question and dragging out the meeting of the study group. I listen contritely to all those who are annoyed, tell them I am sorry. But my thoughts are whirling around the children. We took Gulka to the creche, although we should have kept her at home. We could have kept her home for one day with out a doctor's note, but neither Dima nor I could get off without the note. And if you call the doctor, you have to tell just what hap pened. The doctor would, of course, order an analysis, since it was 689

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intestinal. An analysis?that would take several days. And so we took Gulka to the creche. I am quickly forgiven, even Lydia relents. Marya Matveyevna announces "strictiy among us" that the first of the year we will have a new study group instructor who has a doctorate in philosophy. We get back to our work. Friday is the end of the work week, everybody has plenty to think about: certain parts of the work have to be finished, books and magazines have to be taken out of the library, business appointments have to be made for Monday and personal engagements for the weekend; during lunch hour a mani cure has to be gotten or heels put on. . . . We "mamas" have a lot of shopping to do for two days. And the questionnaire still has to be filled out. It is as though everyone waited for the last day, everyone had questions, and every one wanted to go to the personnel office for information about sick days. It was decided to do this in an organized way?Blonde Lusya was delegated to go and to help with the calculations. I know that no one will have as many sick days as I. But I have no time to think about it?I have plenty to do, like everyone else. I have to go over what I did yesterday in the me chanical lab. All Hie stuff which I threw on my desk yesterday is still lying there in the same position. Too bad I wasn't able to use the entire time offered by Valya. ... I only hope Luska's informa tion, about the extra order being given "the green light" in all the laboratories, turns out to be wrong. Or, at least, let it happen a littie later. According to the schedule, next week we have a whole day in the mechanical lab. Three of us will work: I, their laboratory technician, and Luska. Maybe we'll finish everything? Maybe we'll make it? I enter in the journal the results of yesterday's test, I put away, in the box, the samples thrown down yesterday, I tear up and throw away the scrap paper with the calculations. Luska and I unpack the packages of the manufactured products. I put several sheets of fiber glass plastic and a few short pipes of different sizes on a display stand. I write out the labels. Now I will get down to the summary chart. I have to set it up in such a way that all that is left to do is to enter the new tests in it. But where is it? Yesterday I didn't work on it. The day before yesterday I put it in my drawer under the journal. It's not there. I take everything out of the drawer and put it on the table. The chart is not there. I look through the papers, one by one?not there. I say to myself: "Be calm!" I move everything from the right side of the desk onto the left. Not there! Perhaps I took it into the mechanical lab along with the journal? I run down to Valya's. No, she hasn't 690

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seen it. Is it possible that several days' work has been lost? A sort of numbness comes over me?I sit staring at the wall. I see nothing, I am thinking of nothing. Then I notice the calendar. I look at it, and it suddenly gets to me that Friday, the 13th of December, that's today. Only yesterday I had the feeling, "it's the beginning of December," and now, if you please, it is the middle of the month, and in two weeks I have to submit a report. Will I be able to in these fourteen days . . . , no, only eleven, to finish the tests in the mechanical and electrical laboratories, evaluate the results, make up a new summary chart, and write the report? . . . I am sitting with my hands in my lap, instead of looking for the chart, and thinking that I can't make it. . . . Suddenly I feel a hand on my shoulder, and Dark Lusya, bending down, asks me: "Where are you, Olenka? Are you lost? Or did you lose some thing?" Lusya? Oh, that's so good! I lightly press my cheek to her hand. She understands everything. I am indeed lost. Lost in a heap of work and of cares?the institute's, my home's. "I lost the summary chart of the results of all the tests, a sheet like this," I show its size with my hands. "I shook out everything, I can't understand. . . ." "Could this be it?" asks Lusya, touching a white sheet of paper in the middle of the table. I take the sheet, it opens and materializes into?my chart. I burst out laughing, I simply shake with laughter, I cover my mouth with my hands so that no one will hear and I laugh until tears begin to roll. I laugh and I can't stop. Lusya grabs me by the hand, drags me into the hall, shakes me, and says: "Stop it, stop it at once!" I stand leaning with my back against the wall, the tears flow down my cheeks, and I moan quietly from laughter. "Olya, you are a neurotic," says Lusya. "Congratulations, you're having hysterics!" "You're a neurotic yourself," I answer her tenderly, gasping for breath. "Hysterics?thafs not in style now." I dry my wet face. "I'm just laughing. I have such a funny life. One thing after another, there isn't time to stay with anything. Some kind of a mix of thoughts and feelings. No, I'm not neurotic. . . . And you?look at those circles under your eyes. You're not sleeping again? You're the real neurotic." "I'm a neurotic from 'way back. But I'm six years older than you, and at my house, you know, there're always . . . nerves. But you hold on: you're young, you're healthy, you have a wonderful hus band." She presses my hands with her thin fingers; her long nails 691

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dig into me, but I can bear the pain. She stares directiy into my pupils, as though hypnotizing me. "You're smart, you're able, you're very strong. . . . All right," Lusya releases my hands. "Let's have a smoke. Oh, you don't. . . ." She squeezes a cigarette between her teeth, clicks her lighter, and inhales. "That's too bad?it helps. Though it is better not to get hooked. I'll tell you what: at lunch time you and I'll go food shopping. On the way you'll tell me every thing." We walk along the street, I tell her about the difficulties with the mechanical lab and with Valya, about my conversation with the chief, about Gulka's stomach, about the deadline for finishing the tests?that I'm worried about not making it. Lusya listens, nods her head, now narrows her eyes, now opens them wide, and says, "Yes, yes, yes. . . ." or throws out a sing-song "Ye-e-es?" This makes me feel bettter already. For a few minutes we don't say anything. "Olenka, do you remember, you wanted to know who invented our fiberglass plastic? I promised to tell you." "Yes, to tell me that 'silliest story.'" "Exactly. It's not even a story but just an anecdote. A short one. The idea was mine, I gave it to Yakov. Not because I'm so rich, but because I was pregnant. And I was all set to have the child. . . . Don't think that I was giving in to Suren. I myself decided that it would be better for Markusha. I wouldn't be able to stay at work much longer, I knew that. Let them make it without me, I thought. And so I gave it to him." "Well, and . . ." "And what?" "The baby? So what happened?" "Nothing. I got scared at the last minute. Had an abortion. As usual, secredy from Suren." "What do you mean 'secretiy'?" "Like this: 'I am going on a professional trip,' for five or six days. . . ." I find Lusya's hand and I don't let go of it. We walk this way, side by side. We walk silentiy. In the stores, where the hurry and the crush are greater than usual today, we fill up four shopping bags, and at three o'clock we start out on our way back. I carry my two bags fairly easily but Lusya is simply bent double by her burden. Suddenly we see Shurochka coming towards us: "I decided to come out to help." I tell her to take a bag from Lusya and Lusya tells her to take one from me. Finally we put Shura between us and the three of us 692

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carry the four bags together. We have to get off the sidewalk into the street. Every minute we stop to let a car go by. Two fellows we meet shout to us: "May we join you, girls?" "We have our own boys," I answer. I'm in a good mood because it's a sunny day, because we're blocking everyone's way, because there are three of us. . . . Because I am not alone. We come in and Blonde Lusya appears at once with the list of totals of "sick days." I am first, of course, just as I thought. The notes from the clinic and from the doctors got me off for seventy eight days, almost a third of all working days. All of them because of the children. Everyone copies her figures off the list, so everyone sees who has what. I cannot understand why I feel so embarrassed. Even ashamed. I sort of shrink into myself. I avoid looking at any body. Why? I am not guilty of anything. "Have you filled out your questionnaires?" asks Luska. "Let me see." But we also don't know how to compute the time?how much of it goes for what. The "mamas" confer. We decide that we absolutely must indicate the time spent in commuting?we all live in new dis tricts, we spend almost three hours a day traveling. No one is able to compute "time spent with children." We "spend time" with them in between doing other things. As Shura says: "Seryozhka and I are together in the kitchen the whole evening; he misses me so much during the day, he won't go away from me." "So how should we write about the children?" wonders Blonde Lusya. "Which week's time should we be computing?any week in gen eral or this one in particular?" asks Shura. "Any week," answers Dark Lusya. "Aren't they all the same?" "But I don't go to the movies every week," Luska has a new problem. "Why rack your brain over it?" I say. "I'm taking this week. A week like any other week." It's a stupid question, we conclude. Would it be possible to cal culate the time spent on housework even if one were to walk around all week with a stop-watch in one's hand? Lusya Markoryan sug gests that we indicate the total time that is left after the workday and commuting, and then enumerate what that time is spent on. We are amazed?it turns out that we have from 48 to 53 hours a week for the home. Then why aren't there enough hours? Why does so much unfinished work trail after us from week to week? Who can tell? 693

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Indeed, who can tell how much time is demanded by what is called "family life?" And what exacdy is it? I decide to take my questionnaire home. Dark Lusya does too. We still have to finish up a few things before the end of the day. The trip home is not easy today. There are two heavy bags in my hands weighing me down?everything is bought except for vege tables. In the metro I have to stand?one bag is in my hands die other at my feet. There is a crush. It is impossible to read. I am standing and figuring how much I spent. It always seems to me that I must have lost some money. I had two tens, and now all I have is some silver. I am missing three rubles. I figure again, I try to remember what is in the bags. The second time I figure that I lost four rubles. I stop figuring and begin to look around at those who are sitting. Many are reading: young women?books and magazines; sedate-looking men?newspapers. And over there a fat man in a fur hat is sitting with a gloomy face and looking at KrokodiL8 Young men shift their eyes sideways, lower their eyelids sleepily, just so as not to have to give up their seats. At last Sokol Station. Everyone jumps out and dashes to the nar row stairways. And I can't?I am carrying bags with milk and eggs. I trail at the tail end. When I reach the bus stop there is a fine six busloads long. Should I try to get into a full bus? But what about my bags? Nevertheless, I try getting into the third bus. But the bags in both my hands prevent me from grabbing hold, my foot slips off the high step, I bang my knee painfully, and at that mo ment the bus starts to move. Everyone shouts, I scream. The bus stops; some man, standing near the doors, grabs me and pulls me in; I fall on top of my bags. My knee hurts, and there is probably an omelet in the bag. But, at least, someone offers me a seat. While I am sitting, I can look at my knee, at the hole in my stocking covered with blood and dirt, I can open the bags and see that only a few eggs are crushed and only one carton of milk is crumpled. I feel so bad about the stockings?they cost four rubles! As soon as I open the house door, everyone runs out into the front hall?they've been waiting! Dima takes the bags from me and says: "Madwoman!" I ask: "How is Gulka's stomach?" "It's all right, everything's fine." Kotka jumps on me and almost knocks me off my feet. Gulka de mands immediately "a norage" which she has already spotted. I point to my knee and limp into the bathroom. Dima gets the iodine and cotton, everyone feels sorry for me?I feel so good!

8 Krokodil (Crocodile)?the humor magazine. 694

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I love Friday evening: I can sit at the table a little longer, spend time with the children, put them to bed half an hour later. I can skip the laundry, I can get into a tub. . . . But today, following the sleepless night, we are terribly sleepy, and, after putting the children to bed, we leave everything in the kitchen as is. I am already in bed; Dima is still in the bathroom. My body is already heavy with sleep, but it suddenly occurs to me that Dima might set the alarm clock out of habit. I shove it under the couch with the words, "sit and be still." But the sound of its ticking comes through the thick couch. I take it out to the kitchen and lock it up in the dish closet.

Saturday

On Saturday we sleep late. We, the grown-ups, would sleep even later, but the children get up a little after eight. Saturday morning is the happiest morning: ahead are two days of rest. Kotka wakes us, he comes running to us?he has learned to lower the side of his little bed. Gulka is already jumping in her crib and demanding that we take her out. While the children play with their father, doing somersaults and squealing, I prepare an enormous breakfast. Then I send the children off with Dima to play outside, and get to work. First of all, I put up soup. Dima assures me that the soup at the cafeteria is always tasteless; the children don't say anything, but when they eat my soup they always ask for seconds. While the soup is cooking, I clean the apartment?I dust, wash the floors, shake the blankets out on the balcony (which is not nice, of course, but it's faster that way), and sort the wash: put Dima's and mine to soak in soapy water, collect the outgoing laun dry, and put the children's things aside to be done tomorrow. I grind the meat for hamburgers, wash and put the dry fruit compote on the stove, peel the potatoes. At about three we have dinner. It's a little late for the children, but they have to get their fresh air at least on the week end. We sit at the table for a long time; we eat without rushing. The children ought to nap, but they've overcome their sleepiness. Kotka asks Dima to read Aibolit,9 which he has long since come to know by heart. They settle down on the couch, but Gulka bothers them, whines, and tries to tear up the book. She has to be put down for a nap after all, otherwise there would be no peace for anybody.

9 Dr. Aibolit (Ouch-it-hurts)?Russian equivalent of Dr. Doolittle. 695

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I rock her (which you are not supposed to do) and she falls asleep. Now I have to get to work in the kitchen?wash the stove and scour the burners, clean the dish cabinets, scrub the floor. Then I must wash my hair, wash the clothes put up to soak, iron the chil dren's things that I've brought in from the balcony, wash myself, mend Katka's tights, and sew the hook onto my belt, without fail. Dima has to go to the laundry. Kotka doesn't let him go. He has to take the boy with him (which isn't good?you have to stand in line, it's stuffy, dirty clothes are all around?but they take the sled on the way back they'll play outside some more and get some more fresh air). And I am left alone and have the whole place to myself while I attend to the kitchen and the other things. At seven "the men" come back and demand tea. Then I suddenly remember that Gulka is still asleep. (I forgot about her.) I wake her and she raises a dismal howl. I give her to Dima so that I can make supper. I want to get through early?the children must be bathed today. Gulka carries on at the table?she doesn't want to eat, she's not hungry yet. Kotya eats well?he had plenty of fresh air. "Tomorrow we'll be home the whole day," he says and looks at his father and me. "Of course, tomorrow is Sunday," I reassure him. Kotka is already rubbing his eyes, he wants to sleep. I fill the tub and wash Kotka first; Gulka howls, wants to get in to the bathroom, and keeps opening the door. "Dima, take your daughter," I shout. And I hear his answer: "Maybe that's enough for today? I want to read a little." "And I don't want to read?" "Well, that's your business, but I have to." I, of course, don't have to. I carry Kotka to bed (usually Dima does this), and I see that he is sitting on the couch with an open technical journal, and is, in deed, reading. While going by him I toss off: "By the way, I happen to have a college education too, and I'm a specialist too, like you." "For which you are to be congratulated," answers Dima. This sounds terribly biting and insulting to me. I am rubbing Gulka with a sponge and suddenly tears begin to roll down my cheeks and drop into the bathtub. Gulka looks at me, yells, and tries to climb out. I cannot get her to sit down and I give her a slap. Gulka is insulted and bursts into a fit of crying. Dima appears and says angrily: "Don't take it out on the child." 696

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"Aren't you ashamed?" I shout. "I'm tired, do you understand?? tired!" I become terribly sorry for myself. Now I am howling aloud, yelling that I work and work and the undone work keeps growing, that my youth is passing, that I did not sit down for a minute the whole day. . . . Suddenly from the nursery comes a frightful cry: "Papa, don't beat Mama, don't beat Mama!" Dima grabs Gulka, who is already wrapped in a towel, and we run to the nursery. Kotka is standing in bed, all in tears, and re peating: "Don't beat Mama!" I pick him up in my arms and begin to console him: "What are you imagining, my little boy? Papa never beat me. Our Papa is kind. Papa is good. . . ." Dima says that Kotya must have had a frightful dream. He strokes and kisses his son. We stand holding the children, pressed tigbdy against each other. "And why is she crying?" asks Kotya, passing his little hand over my wet face. "Mama is tired," answers Dima. "Her hands hurt, her feet hurt, her back hurts." This I cannot bear to hear. I shove Kotka onto Dima's other arm, run into the bathroom, grab a towel, and, covering my face with it, cry so hard that I shake. Now I don't know about what?about everything at once. Dima comes up to me; he puts his arms around me, pats me on the back, and strokes me gentiy, muttering: "So, that's enough ... so, calm down ... so, forgive me ... so, stop_" I quiet down and sob only occasionally. I am already ashamed that I let myself go this way. What happened, exactiy? I can't understand it myself. Dima doesn't let me do anything more; he puts me to bed like a child, brings me a cup of hot tea. I drink it, he tucks me in, and I fall asleep to the sounds coining from the kitchen?the splash of water in the dishpan, the clatter of dishes, the shuffling of feet. I awake and don't immediately understand what it is now?morn ing, evening, and of which day? The table lamp is on, the shade covered with a newspaper. Dima is reading. I can see only one half of his face: his convex forehead, light-colored hair?it is beginning to thin?a heavy eyelid, and a thin cheek?or is it the shadow from the lamp? He looks tired. He turns the page noiselessly and I see his hand with sparse reddish hair and a bitten-off nail on the index 697

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finger. "Poor Dimka, it's rough for him too," I think to myself. "And I had to howl like a fool, to top it all. ... I feel sorry for you. I love you. . . ." He straightens up, looks at me, and asks, smiling: "Well, how are you, Olka, alive and well?" I silently pull a hand from under the covers and stretch it out to him.

Sunday We are lying in bed, just lying?my head is resting against his chin, his arm is around my shoulders. We are lying and talking about all sorts of things: about the New Year and the New Year tree, that today we must go to buy vegetables, that Kotka doesn't want to go to nursery school. . . . "Dim, what do you think, can love between husband and wife be eternal?" "But we are not eternal. . . ." "Well, of course, but can it be lasting?" "And are you already beginning to have doubts?" "No, tell me, what do you think love is?" "Well, when it's good when you're together, the way it is with us." "And when children come. . . ." "Yes, of course, children come." "And when they shouldn't come any more." "Well, what of that? That's life. Love is part of life. Let's get up." "And when there isn't time to talk." "Well, talking's not the most important thing." "Yes, probably our early ancestors had no need of it." "Well, all right, let's talk. . . . What did you want to talk about?" I am silent. I don't know what I wanted to talk about. I just wanted to talk. Not about vegetables. About something else. About something very important and very necessary, but I can't begin right off. . . . Maybe about the soul? I say: "There is only one five-ruble bill in the box." Dima laughs: some conversation. "Why are you laughing? It's always like this?we talk only about money, about groceries, well, about the children, of course." "Don't make things up, we talk about many other things." "I don't know. I don't remember. . . ." "All right, we'd better get up." "No, about what 'other things'? For instance?" It seems to me that Dima doesn't answer for a very long time. "Aha, you don't know," I silently gloat. But Dima recalls: 698

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"Didn't we talk about the American presidency? About the cos mos?many times? . . . About figure skaters?we discussed whether it was a sport or an art. . . . About Vietnam, about Czechoslo vakia. . . . We also talked about a new television set and the Fourth Program," Dima is continuing to recall conscientiously the subjects of our conversations. "By the way, when are we going to buy a new television set?" "That's what I've been saying: there is one five-ruble bill in the box_" "But we have a fund. . . ." We had begun to put aside an "acquisitions fund." We keep it in my old purse, and the box holds money for current expenses. We need many things?for Dima, a raincoat; for me, shoes, and, definitely, a dress; for die children, summer things. We have a tele vision set?an old KVN-4910 discarded by Aunt Sonya. "It's a long way to television," I say. "Our fund is growing poorly." "But we had decided not to spend all the money, so why do you?" Dima reproaches me. "I don't know, everything seems to be normal, but there isn't enough." Dima says that this way we'll never have anything. And I answer him that I spend only on food. "Then you spend too much." "Then you eat too much." "I eat too much?!" Dima is insulted. "That's news, let's figure out who eats how much!" We are no longer lying but sitting facing one another. "I'm sorry," I say. "We, we eat too much." "So what can I do about that?" "And ir "You're the housekeeper." "Tell me what not to buy, and I won't. Let's stop buying milk." "Let's better end this stupid conversation. If you're incapable of managing these things, say so." "Yes, yes, yes, I'm incapable. I'm stupid and everything I say is stupid. ..." I jump up and go into the bathroom. There I turn on the faucet and wash my face with cold water. "Stop this, stop it immediately," I say to myself. Now I will get under the shower, and return to normal. Why am I so angry? I don't know. Maybe because I'm always afraid of getting pregnant. Maybe because of the pills I take. Who knows?

10 KVN-49?the first Russian-made television model. 699

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Or maybe I have no more need for it altogether?this love? This thought makes me sad, sorry for myself, sorry for Dima. The feeling of pity and the warm water do their work: I come out of the shower refreshed and feeling better towards the world. The children are squealing and laughing?playing with their father. I take out clean clothes for them. We dress them. "Look what beautiful children we have," I say and call them into the kitchen to set the table together, "while Papa is washing." During breakfast there is a brief planning session. What we have to do today: take the bus to the vegetable store, wash the children's clothes, iron everything. . . . "Drop everything, let's go play outside!" Dima concludes. "Look at that sun!" "Mama, Mommy, come with us," begs Kotka. "Let's go look at the sun!" I give in. I will put my work off till after dinner. We get dressed, take the sled, and go off to the canal to go sled ding. We all take turns going down the hill, and Gulka goes with Dima or with me. The hill is steep, smoothed down by sleds; the sled seems to fly; the snow spray makes a rainbow underfoot; and all around it sparkles and dazzles. Sometimes the sled turns over, the children squeal, we all laugh. Wonderful! We come home covered with snow, hungry, happy. Let Dima eat first, then go. I cook macaroni, warm up the soup and the ham burgers. The children sit right down at the table and watch the flames under the pots. I'm in a very good mood after the sledding. After putting the children to sleep and getting Dima off for the vegetables, I start to work on everything at once?I throw the children's clothes into a wash pan, wash the dishes, spread a blanket on the table, and take out the iron. And suddenly I have an idea?I will shorten my skirt. Why do I walk around like an old woman with my knees half-covered! I quickly take down the hem, decide how much ma terial I need to turn up, cut off the rest. Dima finds me at this work when he comes back, carrying a full rucksack. "You see, Olka, how good the outdoors is for you." Of course, it's good for me. And, finishing the basting, I put on the skirt. Dima says, "Hmm," looks me over, and laughs: "It will be zero degrees tomorrow, you'll be sewing it back on. But, on the whole, you have nice legs." I turn on the iron?to press down the hem. Then I will sew it, and it will be done! "Press my pants while you are at it," asks Dima. "Dim, please, press them yourself, I want to finish the skirt." 700

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"But you are ironing anyway." "Dim, it's not 'anyway'; I beg you, let me finish. I still have to wash the children's things, to iron yesterday's wash." "Then why are you wasting time on foolishness?" "Dim, let's not discuss it, I beg you, press your pants yourself today, I have to finish sewing." "And where are you going tomorrow?" he asks suspiciously. "Where? To a ball!" "I see. I was just thinking maybe there's something going on at work." "Maybe there is 'something,'" I am distracting him deliberately. (After all, I must somehow finish hemming the skirt in peace and get out of pressing the pants.) "You remember, I told you about the questionnaire. Today I have to fill it out. Tomorrow demogra phers will come?to collect the questionnaires, to talk to us. . . ." "Oh!" (Oh, God, he must be thinking that I decided to shorten my skirt for this occasion!) As I sew, I tell Dima that they calculated our "sick" days, that I have seventy-eight days?almost a whole quarter. "What do you think, Olka, perhaps it would be better if you didn't work? Just think, you spend almost half the year at home." "And you want to shut me in there for the whole year? And could we live on your salary?" "If I were to be freed of all this," Dima looks around the kitchen, at the iron, the rucksack, "I could earn more. Two hundred, two hundred and twenty I could guarantee. Actually, after subtracting all your days off without pay, you earn about sixty rubles a month. It's unprofitable!" "Fiddlesticks!" I say. "Fiddlesticks! We don't agree to this! Then all this boring stuff," I also look around the kitchen, "is for me alone, and only interesting things for yourself. Think of it, 'it's unprofita ble_' Capitalist!" "Capitalist, indeed," Dima smiles ironically. "It's not just the money. The children would benefit. Nursery school?that's not too bad, but the creche. . . . Gulka almost never gets outdoors in winter. And these endless colds?!" "Dima, do you really think that I wouldn't want to do what's best for the children? I would like to, very much! But what you are suggesting would just . . . destroy me. And my five years of study? My degree? My professional standing? My dissertation subject? How easy it is for you to throw it all out?whisk! and it's finished! And what would I be like, staying home? Angry, as the devil: I'd growl at you all the time. And, anyway, what are we talking about? 701

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We couldn't live on your salary. And, so far, nothing else, nothing definite, has been offered to you. . . ." "Don't be hurt, Olya, you're probably right. It's not worth talking about it. I shouldn't have started. It's just that I fancied I saw a kind of . . . rationally constructed life. And that if I didn't have to hurry to get the children, I could work differently, not limiting myself. . . . Maybe it's egotism, I don't know. Let's stop talking about it; it's all right He goes out of the kitchen, I look after him, and suddenly I want to call him back and say, "Forgive me, Dima." But I don't do it. "Hey, hully-gully,11 it's time to get up!" Dima shouts. That's our "signal." He gets Kotya and Gulya up, the children drink milk, we spend two minutes discussing whether to go out again, and decide against it. If we go out, there will be nothing left of the evening. Dima has had enough walking and I still have many things to do. Kotka sits himself down on the floor with his blocks. He loves to build, and he constructs houses, bridges, streets, and some kind of construction he calls "skyscraper-palace." But Gulka is a problem she bothers her brother, she tries to knock down the blocks, grabs them, carries them away, and hides them. "Mama, speak to her! Papa, speak to her!" Kotka repeatedly calls to us. No words have any effect on Gulka?she looks straight out and says bluntly: "Gulya want knock down house." Then I make a "daughter" for her. A "daughter" is a little play suit, stuffed with rags. I put a small pillow wrapped in white into the hood and draw a face on it. Gulya doesn't get along with dolls, but she drags the "daughter" all over the house and talks to her. Sunday evening passes peacefully and quiedy. The children play. Dima reads. I wash clothes and make supper. "I mustn't forget to sew the hook on my belt," I repeat several times. That's all, I think! Oh, yes, I still have to fill out the questionnaire. Well, that's after the children go to bed. After eating, after carrying on awhile?they don't want to end their Sunday activities?the children collect the scattered blocks. We find the ones Gulya hid?under the bathtub, in the hall inside my boots. We wash their hands and faces, brush their teeth, scold Gulka who tries to break away and yells: "Gulya want dirty."

11 Hully-gully?American dance, popular with young Russians in the 1960's. 702

This content downloaded from 152.23.0.181 on Fri, 10 Jan 2020 16:38:35 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms A Week Like Any Other Week

And, finally, we put them to bed. There is still some time left. Should I read? Or maybe watch television? Oh, yes?the questionnaire! I sit down at the table with it. Dima looks over my shoulder and makes critical remarks. I ask him not to bother me, I want to hurry up and finish. It's ready. Now I will get a book and curl up on the sofa. I am choosing from the bookcase. Maybe I should at last start Forsyte Saga? Dima gave me these two volumes on my next to last birthday. No, I won't be able to get through it?how could I take such a thick book on the bus? We'll put it off once more until vacation. I choose something lighter?stories by Sergey Antonov.12 A quiet Sunday evening. We are sitting and reading. In about twenty minutes Dima asks: "And what about my pants?" We compromise: I will press his pants and he will read aloud to me. Dima doesn't want Antonov, and takes the latest issue of Science. We haven't looked at it yet. He begins to read the article by Venttsel, "Operations Research," but it is difficult for me to grasp formulas by ear. Then Dima goes out of the kitchen and I remain alone with his pants. I am already in bed. Dima winds the alarm clock and turns out the light. Now I remember the belt hook. I won't get up for any thing, let it be damned. In the middle of the night I wake up I don't know why. Some thing is disturbing me. I get up quietiy, so as not to wake Dima; I go to look at the children. They'd been tossing in bed?Kotya has knocked off his blankets; Gulka slid off the pillow, stuck her foot out of bed. I put them down straight, cover them, touch and pat their heads?to see if they are warm. The children sigh, smack their lips, and are again breathing evenly?peacefully, cozily. Then what is disturbing me? I don't know. I lie on my back with my eyes open. I lie and listen to the silence. The radiator pipes are sighing. The upstairs neigh bors' wall clock is ticking. The pendulum upstairs beats time in measured strokes, and our alarm clock beats this same time like a drum roll, sputtering, gasping. And so ends one more week, the next to the last week of this year.

12 A contemporary Russian writer.

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